Former Cop, O.J. Confidante Opens Up About Simpson Case

With next week marking 22 years since the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, the investigation into the killings and the infamous trial of Simpson’s husband, O.J. Simpson, have begun to resurface in popular culture.

The renewed spotlight has led several key figures in the case to relive events, among them Ron Shipp, a former Los Angeles police officer and longtime friend of O.J. Simpson who ultimately testified against him.

In an interview with Vanity Fair’s Hive published Thursday, Shipp discussed how his perception of the case and acceptance of O.J.’s guilt evolved over time.

According to Shipp, the first thought that came to mind when he learned of Nicole Simpson’s death was O.J. being the killer.

“My mom paged me. Everything that I knew she said all popped in my brain. Being a cop, I said to myself, ‘Man, he killed her,'” said Shipp. “I immediately called Rockingham [Simpson’s house]. Mark Fuhrman answered the phone. I knew him from the police. I asked, ‘Did O.J. do it?’ He kept saying, ‘I can’t tell you that.’ I got mad and hung up on him.”

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“I was just sitting there thinking of her [Nicole] saying, ‘He’s going to kill me,'” Shipp said. “For whatever reason, I ended up calling the house again that afternoon and O.J. answered. I said, ‘Are you OK? What’s going on?’ He asked me to come by after work.”

“I still didn’t want to believe it at that point, but I was suspicious. I was trying to make all the allowances in the world that he wouldn’t do that. [Simpson friend and attorney] Bob Kardashian and I were the only guys left,” Shipp continued.

“We walked out through the front of the house and O.J. called me back in. I went up to his room with him and he started asking me how long it took DNA to come back. Why would you want to know how long it takes to get blood results?” he said.

Shipp said the final push to testify against Simpson came after he saw the unfiltered images of the wounds Nicole Simpson suffered during the murder.

“What really made me testify, and I didn’t realize what Chris [Darden, one of the prosecutors in the case] was doing at the time, but he left the homicide book in front of me and left me alone for a while. I didn’t even realize it was there at first, because I was getting kind of angry because he was keeping me waiting. But then I opened it up and I saw what the pictures were,” Shipp recalled.

Ron Shipp is interviewed by Christopher Darden during the O.J. Simpson trial.

“They were unfiltered, the actual homicide and autopsy pictures. You sit there and you look at somebody you know. You know, I loved Nicole and I looked at her like a little sister. It was horrific. When Chris came back and sat down, I said, ‘Chris, you don’t have to say another word. I’m testifying,'” said Shipp.

The most shocking moment for Shipp came in the aftermath of the case when Simpson’s attorney, the late Johnnie Cochran, approached him and apologized for the verdict.

“As I was walking out, I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Johnnie Cochran. I remember that I used to say at the time that if I ever ran into any of those guys, I’d knock the hell out of them because I was so mad. I was shocked to see it was him standing there,” Shipp recalled of the moment.

“He asked me if I was OK. He kept saying, ‘You know it was business. It was business, Ron.’ He gave me a quick hug and walked off. I didn’t want to tell anybody that Johnnie Cochran hugged me. And I didn’t. I didn’t tell a soul about that.”

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